


riding, falling, joining

by blackcanarys



Category: Wonder Woman (Movies - Jenkins)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:48:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28353450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackcanarys/pseuds/blackcanarys
Summary: The living surround her, in her Washington D.C. apartment. Laughing, loving, complaining, moaning, to say the least—to be among the living, and not dancing among the dead.Death could be defied, but not without a price. Gods had insurmountable power, and the gift of immortality retained them a living memory longer than that of recorded history. She had held Steve in her arms, kissed him and done everything in-between, but the barrier that she faces to him now?Death was not a barrier to cross or break. Life and Death had always been in a dance of opposites with the other, the counterbalance of all things—magic and power could circumvent it, of course, but the price was too high. It would never be worth it.A character study of Diana Prince, leading up to the Christmas of 1984.
Relationships: Diana (Wonder Woman)/Steve Trevor
Comments: 1
Kudos: 35





	riding, falling, joining

**Author's Note:**

  * For [melodiousmadrigals](https://archiveofourown.org/users/melodiousmadrigals/gifts).



> Lenci!!! I'm your Wondertrev Secret Santa, and I hope you like your gift <33

i.

There’s a Grief, heavy in her heart. To fight for love, for justice and the betterment of everyone—but on a more personal scale, for her own happiness. To be a silent witness to history is one thing, but she had chosen to become an active participant in history, for the betterment of people who otherwise would’ve been harmed had she not stepped in. Time as her witness and history as her testimony, she had fought for the betterment of humanity, for man kind to be _better_. 

There’s another part of her, a cynical belief that had blossomed in 1918, that believes that people actively chose not to do so. So much of history, in her experience, had been the passivity of good people—to know something is wrong but deem it not important, that was unconscionable. History, as her witness, would prove this as well. 

Of everyone she’d fought with in Veld, in the Great War, Etta was the last to pass. She remembers the night Etta had passed: she was in her seventies by then, and her health had been declining anyway. To the Gods, Diana had wished desperately for one of them to allow her to keep Etta—her last remaining anchor to 1918, the last friend who bore living memory of what had happened, and who had been lost. Etta passed anyway, in her sleep. 

What Diana had lost that day, she chooses not to reflect on. They are alive in her memory, for as long as she lives; the dead have not truly passed into the land of the forgotten and unreachable if their memory is kept alive. Grief is a long-time friend of hers, chasing her akin to a shadow she cannot escape. 

She chafes at the thought, then—she had let Grief in a long time ago, back in 1918. In some ways, Grief had been her longest companion, even before she began to know Steve. The fear of the unknown was natural, she thinks, but what would come to pass is irreversible. Honor the sacrifice of people lost, and their memories would live on. Light a candle for the safe passage of the dead. Fight for the living, to prevent more from dying before their time. 

And yet, Diana muses. Grief trails her now, in this Christmas Fair in 1984. 

ii. 

In Diana’s defense, she hadn’t come to the fair to be melancholy. Barbara Minerva had chosen not to come back to the Smithsonian, and Diana hadn’t had the heart to look for her after Lord’s defeat. Life had continued, albeit conversations surrounding Lord had been muted, confused—the feeling of pandemonium and regret were pronounced, but as Diana grimaces at what could have been, it could have been much worse.

Pain becomes purpose, she’s learned over time. The Grief that had fueled her tears becomes her motivation—for the dead, for those who yearned to pass and those who had yet to pass, she would fight in their memory. Not just to honor them, but cherish and value them for what they were. 

Steve had described flying as an equilibrium. He was completely in control, among wind and air in a metal bird that could easily lead to the death of innocents; wind and air, in the knowledge that it could be possible to ride it, to catch it and join it for his own pursuits. A bittersweet smile tugs at her lips, and she allows it, walking through the fair, families with young children everywhere she looks. 

Oh, what an honor it was to be _alive_.

iii. 

The living surround her, in her Washington D.C. apartment. Laughing, loving, complaining, moaning, to say the least—to be among the living, and not dancing among the dead. 

Death could be defied, but not without a price. Gods had insurmountable power, and the gift of immortality retained them a living memory longer than that of recorded history. She had held Steve in her arms, kissed him and done everything in-between, but the barrier that she faces to him now?

Death was not a barrier to cross or break. Life and Death had always been in a dance of opposites with the other, the counterbalance of all things—magic and power could circumvent it, of course, but the price was too high. It would never be worth it.

The laugh in her throat is bitter, steeped in Grief. Grief, in knowing what had happened in order to see Steve once more, just for him to remind her that there was something else ahead. Grief, in knowing that she had looked into his blue eyes once more, held him in her arms and more—the feeling never leaves her, but she misses remembering him without the bittersweet nostalgia of the past.

 _Stay with me_ , she’d pleaded in a dream once. It was 1918 once more, in their night in Veld. Steve passes her a pint of beer, dances with her and kisses her (her first kiss with a man, but not the first one she had ever experienced); Charlie plays the piano without a concern in the world, and this great, terrible war hadn’t felt impossibly hopeless for once. Snow falls on her shoulders, on her warm cape, as she and Steve dance by candlelight. 

In horror, she’d realized that Veld faded. The village stays the same, but the shelled-out pub empties, and no music nor guests could be found. Steve slips from her arms, the ghost of a memory. Her memory had become a nightmare, as every inch of her being screams for the dead to stay. 

She knows, that unless the laws of Life and Death were defied, they were permanent boundaries. Death would claim all who she loved eventually, and Themyscira had been lost to her since 1918—those she remembered so fondly in her memories would remain that way, nothing more than a memory now.

She’d woken up with tears in her eyes that morning, the ever-present shadow of Grief perching on her shoulder, urging her to act with every reminder of her life.

iv. 

That November, she’d woken up one day dreaming of Steve. Of his presence, of the fact his hair had grayed, of his bright blue eyes and the fact he was still dead.

That Saturday morning, she had seriously entertained who (or what) could bring him back to her. ARGUS, perhaps, but ARGUS was supposed to be top secret. But she’s heard plenty of hypotheticals that more than determined they existed; the metahuman hypothesis had been brought up as an argument for it, then. 

She never saw the man who made that joke ever again, but she supposes, that was the point. Who would believe that there were humans that weren’t entirely human, or would choose to? E.T. was just a silly film, unrealistic but entertaining. Still, she can’t help but think—she’d never heard of ARGUS or anything like that before. It appeared to have started in response to Maxwell Lord, and for that, well. 

She absentmindedly rubs her hand over his clock—the one from 1918, not the one from 1984. She’d kept the one from July tucked away in one of her drawers, behind papers and tax filings. 

_I can save today, you can save the world. I wish we had more time._

She doesn’t know what happened to the photo of all of them, from 1918. It’s the only photograph she has of all of them together, alive. Buried within the testimonial pages of history now, she thinks bittersweetly, lost to the death and destruction of the European front. 

There’s a spot on her wall for it, if she’s ever able to find it. 

v.

Grief, she’s learned, is a form of Love. 

There are decades of memories captured in letters and photographs, and as she shuffles through her decade old ornaments, memories can’t help but come to mind. Etta had insisted on buying them, in that sale in 1925–she’d laughed at the idea then, but she still holds a relatively-preserved angel in her hand. They went in the other box, for ornaments that were not determined not to be safe—lead paint wouldn’t affect her, but the value they held couldn’t be measured.

The new collection of blue ornaments she’d bought the other week sits on her table, unopened. One of them had been the same color as Steve’s eyes, a blue that made his eyes seem muted, and the rest had been history. Etta’s insistence on having new ornaments every year pays off now, and while Diana still doesn’t buy them often, she would buy them on occasion. 

There’s a locked drawer at the bottom of her desk, filled with books full of old memories. Entire collections of letters and mementos she had kept, preserved beyond the reach and ravaging of time. Black and white photographs, from a time before color photography existed. She’s got on her bookshelf a picture of herself at Trevor Ranch, from before the farm had been foreclosed on due to the Great Depression; it’s been over sixty years now, since that photo.

They had gone together, she with Etta, Charlie, Chief and Sameer. She misses them, their companionship. How she wishes to receive one more letter from them now, a telegram from back when they were used, or the ringing of her landline at odd hours from Chief. Time slips from her fingers that morning, lost in the remembrance, in the indulgence of her selfishness. They had lived long, fulfilling lives; extending it through any means would’ve just been punishment, cheating the rightful boundaries of life and death.

But, and Diana’s certain of this, if you were to ask her if she regretted bringing Steve back? To hold him in her arms once more, to hear his voice, to know that she wasn’t completely lonely?

She shakes her head then. The price was too great, and she knew better than anyone alive to be careful what you wished for. But would she have gone back, to savor the experience for just one second longer? Without hesitation, yes. In a heartbeat. 

In some ways, he was still her North Star. He always would be.

vi.

Lex Luthor had called it the metahuman hypothesis. The idea that Earth wasn’t just inhabited by humans, but by people who had superhuman abilities, through whatever means it took. A silly idea, but considering that half the populace just viewed Superman as a foreign menace of unknown origin, _well_. 

Even the most powerful metahuman wouldn’t have the power she wielded, but such was the nature of her work. ARGUS didn’t exist, and neither does the metahuman hypothesis. She was but a shadow, and Amanda Waller knew better than anyone what had prompted ARGUS to form in the first place, back in 1984. Maxwell Lord, and the insanity that never was.

Still, it had confirmed the metahuman hypothesis. She used to have a woman in her holding cells, Barbara Ann Minerva, who hadn’t aged a day from the ‘80s, at the very least. The same woman who, when enraged, would transform into a feral cat (a Cheetah, Waller thinks with a snort). They had abandoned that site, after Minerva took out everyone in that holding site. Not one body was recognizable, when it came time for the autopsies. 

Amanda Waller had laughed, when she’d read that report—he’s barely scratched the surface there, and that was before his abomination had shoved a blade of Kryptonian minerals through Superman’s heart. 

Back when he was still dead, and how simple life had been then. But then, Bruce Wayne had decided the opposite: revive the Man of Steel, someone he had sought to kill in the past, through an unholy matrimony of humans, metahumans and everything else in-between. On principle, Gotham City bred insanity but even she didn't see this coming. She should've.

They call themselves the Justice League, now. Justice was an ideal, and the only ideal that mattered was compliance. Not necessarily fear, but it was extremely useful—she doesn’t care what motivates her soldiers, as long as they don’t ask the wrong questions and do what they’re told. 

She’s had to add a new rule of compliance, since. A scarlet speedster had raced back in time, throwing equilibrium itself into question—had it been up to her, he would be sitting in a black hole in ARGUS, locked away from anything that would allow him to escape. Until the day he died, and even then, she’d order the body to be cremated multiple times. Which reminded her, she needed Flag to debrief her with updates on the metahumans. 

Her third rule: all she expected was loyalty. It didn’t matter where or when her trusted lieutenants come from. 

Flag had been alerted to a man long associated with one of the League—Captain Steven Trevor, of the United States Army. He had served during World War I, far before her time, but from what she’s heard of the man, he would serve perfectly as an ARGUS asset. 

Flag sends along an update: Captain Trevor would be joining her, in a few days time.

She’s already taking bets on how soon Wonder Woman would become involved in her business, once again.

**Author's Note:**

> For the Wondertrev Net Secret Santa! Thanks for reading, y'all. Happy Holidays and have a wonderful New Year.


End file.
